Russ North, born 22 July 1965 in England, is a singer, best known for his role in the heavy metal band Cloven Hoof.[1] North had two stints with Cloven Hoof, from 1987 to 1990, and again from 2006 to 2009. He recently had just rejoined the band in 2010 after their singer Matt Moreton fell ill and the rest of the band members (guitarists Mick Powell and Ben Read, and longtime drummer Jon Brown) betrayed and ditched bassist Lee Payne during their 2010 tour.
Contents |
Russ North (vocals) and Andy Wood (guitar) were once members of Tredegar. Prior to Tredegar splitting up, Cloven Hoof bassist Lee Payne brought the both of them into his band in 1988.
After the unfortunate 1986 departures of Rob Kendrick (vocals), along with both original band members Stephen Rounds (guitar) and Kevin Pountey (drums), only original member Lee Payne had remained active, and thus struggled to find new musicians to reform Cloven Hoof. But it wasn't until around 1988 that Payne had succeeded at last with a fresher line-up.
Prior to immediately leaving the band Tredegar, Russ North was quite fond of Cloven Hoof's first album, that when the band needed a new singer, guitarist Andy Wood (another ex-member of Tredegar) had joined Lee Payne's band and referred North to joining. Before North's audition, the band met up at Payne’s parents' pub. And on a more amusing note, Lee and Russ first met each other in the men's toilet room. He joined the band immediately, and along with drummer Jon Brown.
In 1988, the line-up was complete for Cloven Hoof, and so they set out to work on their second full-length studio album, Dominator. It was the first release by the band that closed doors on the "four elements" styled stage names, that landed them further towards the stepping stones to epic power metal.
The year after the successful release of North's first album with Cloven Hoof, 1989's A Sultan's Ransom was followed, thus ending up as the band's most successful release of all time. But unfortunately due to contractual difficulties, the band had to split up in 1990.
The only known fact about Russ North in the 1990s was that after singer Bruce Dickinson had left Iron Maiden in 1993, the band were seeking other frontmen to audition, and Russ made it to the last two in the roster, with Blaze Bayley at bassist Steve Harris' house. But instead of recruiting Russ, the band took in Bayley instead.
In the summer of 2001, Lee Payne resurfaced the band and began looking for a new line-up after all these years of halt. However, at that time none of the past members were featured on the line-up, and instead Lee hired three studio musicians to record their comeback fourth studio album, 2006's Eye of the Sun, in which the title was inspired by a track of the same name from, the 1986 Fighting Back live album.
North currently uses Shure SM 58 and Sennheiser microphones.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||